I would doubt it was from a backup set. I asked if they haqd one and was led to believe there was none. 2) there was no room on the ship to store a second set of chips. 3) if the set was not stored on the ship why we're they not put into play when they sailed the second ship or have turned up In the market place after all these years if they were in some warehouse. My thought is they were made for those display cases you could find any place you could special order chips